Season Preview: John Jay Girls Basketball

John Jay's girls basketball team will be a young team as it heads into its first game of the season at Lakeland 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 2 in the opening round of the Hornets' tournament. The consolation and championship games will be played Saturday, Dec. 4 at noon and 4 p.m.

Horace Greeley will play Walter Panas in the tournament opener at 5 p.m. Dec. 2.

While John Jay is young, it is fortunate to have one of the best scorers around to lead it in 5-7 junior guard Raegan Knox.

Knox can do it all for the Indians, who finished 10-9 and qualified for the sectionals a year ago. She is coming off a season where she averaged 20 points, eight rebounds and four steals per game.

"Raegan is going to be our go-to player," John Jay coach Greg Blake said. "She already has two years experience on the varsity. She also played in the Empire State Games and did really well."

Blake elaborated on what makes Raegan such a great player.

"She plays an all-around game," Blake said. "She can shoot, she can go to the hoop, she plays defense. She is a pretty solid basketball player."

John Jay also has a solid coach in Blake, who brings with him 37 years of coaching to the Indians. Blake is no stranger to John Jay as he was the head boys coach at the school from 1988-96, which included making it to the sectional finals at the Westchester County Center in White Plains in '88.

Blake also was an assistant coach for the John Jay boys squad during the '99 and 2000 seasons.

Blake is very excited about getting the chance to now coach the girls at John Jay, saying that their attitude is great and that they have been a pleasure to work with in the short time that he has known them.

"When I first met some of the kids, they were very enthusiastic about the season, they wanted to do well," Blake said. "The kids have been really working hard."

"It's a young team," Blake added. "We only have one senior in the program. A lot of them are sophomores and juniors that played last year. I don't have a set lineup right now."

Kristin Meehan, a 5-8 forward, is John Jay's lone senior. Blake feels that with her experience, she will be able to help the younger players on John Jay a lot.

Another player Blake will be counting on to produce is 5-9 sophomore small forward Sydney Glenn, who played on the varsity last year as a freshman.

Also returning from last year's team are 5-8 junior point guard Lauren Murray, 6-0 sophomore center Sarah Lang, 5-10 junior power forward Jen Oddo and 5-8 junior small forward Paige Treyz.

Joining the returnees are newcomers, 6-0 sophomore forward/center Molly O'Reilly, 5-11 freshman forward/center Molly Newcomb, 5-7 freshman guard Courtney Knox, 5-5 freshman guard Sasha Puglisi and 5-6 sophomore guard Delaney Spencer.